Delegated or secondary legislation allows the Government to make changes to a law without needing to push through a completely new Act of Parliament. The original Act (also known as primary legislation) would have made provisions for future delegated legislation that could alter the law to differing degrees. Statutory Instruments (SIs) are often called orders, rules or regulations. SIs can have different types of Parliamentary procedure for example, the affirmative procedure or the negative procedure. These procedures will have to be followed before the change to the law can be made.
Further information on this subject can be found from the following links.
Brief Guides to Parliament: Delegated Legislation (
PDF 350 KB)
About Parliament: Delegated legislation
Legislation website
Related glossary term: Acts of Parliament